Pay telephones are standard fixtures in public areas and their ubiquity is a testimony to their growing utility. With the recent advances in telephone design and technology, pay phones which heretofore were large, bulky, electromechanical devices have now been reduced to relatively small sizes.
Desk top pay phones are now becoming standard fixtures in many businesses and offices. Such phones are relatively small items, generally of a similar size to standard consumer telephones. They are frequently owned by owners or operators of businesses and are revenue generating items as well as a service to employees and customers of such businesses. Typically, desk top pay phones fulfill a need for low volume public access calling.
The very portability of such phones is a source of their main problem. A desk top pay phone is secured solely by a single telephone line connection and hence is easily stolen by simply severing that connection and carrying the phone off. In order to conserve space, desk top pay phones generally have a small cash box which tends to be very unsecure. A thief can thus simply walk away with the entire telephone or quickly pry open the coin box and loot the contents.
From the foregoing it should be apparent that there is a need to secure desk top coin operated telephones so as to prevent the theft of the phone and/or its contents. Additionally, it would be desirable to increase the capacity of the coin boxes of such phones.
The prior art presents no solution to the particular problems presented by desk top pay telephones. Heretofore, available utility-owned pay telephones are large, heavy items having a configuration much different than present desk top phones. The prior art is represented by several mounting systems for previously employed pay telephones as for example U.S. Pat. No. 3,398,244 which discloses a mounting assembly for flush mounting a pay telephone so that only the operative portions thereof project outward from a wall. U.S. Pat. No. 4,396,176 discloses a vandal proof telephone booth system having a protective casing adapted to surround a major portion of a prior art pay telephone and further including a bracket adapted to mount such an encased phone so as to prevent vandalism thereof. Neither of these prior art patents disclose mounting assemblies which can be adapted for use with desk top pay telephones.
The present invention provides for a lock-down holder for a desk top coin operated telephone which permits the phone to be readily affixed to a subjacent surface such as a desk top or wall. The holder allows for ready affixation and removal of the telephone without the need for any modification of the telephone assembly itself and in particular embodiments allows for increase in the coin storage capacity of the telephone. These and other advantages of the present invention will be readily apparent from the drawings, description, discussion and claims which follow.